Jack Sparrow Must Die!
by Runt Thunderbelch
Summary: With his captain's share of the treasure of the Isla de Muerta, Captain Jack Sparrow now has life made.  Then assassins begin appearing from every direction.
1. The Richest Man on Tortuga

These events take place immediately after those in "The Legend of the Black Pearl."

Disclaimer: I make no claim on the intellectual property rights of "Pirates of the Caribbean." This story produces no revenues. It exists merely to bring joy and merriment into the readers' otherwise drab, dreary and wretched lives.

Jack Sparrow Must Die!

By

Runt Thunderbelch

**Chapter 1: The Richest Man on Tortuga; Beer Brawl in the Devil's Playground; Breakfast; An Explosion; Holding onto a Shark's Tail**

"Is it true what they say about you, guvnor?"

"That depends, luv," replied Captain Jack Sparrow. "If what they say is bad, then it's almost certainly true. If it's good, then not so much."

Azelia dropped a pretty little curtsey. "They say you're the richest man on the Isle of Tortuga."

"Aye luv, I expect that's true."

Azelia was one of those wenches whose chest was far too big and who blouse was far too small. Jack liked her a lot.

Cerelia next to her also dropped a curtsey. "Some say, you're the richest man in the whole Caribbean."

"Well," Jack thought about this, "that _might_ be true."

Cerelia had the face of an angel who'd just been kicked out of Heaven for bad behavior. Jack liked her a lot too.

Ennea next to them also dropped a curtsy. "Some say, you're the richest man in all the world."

"The world's an awful big place, luv."

Ennea had hair as smooth and as silky as spun gold. Jack liked gold a lot. She took a step forward and whispered, "They say you voluntarily took on the Curse of Cortez so's you could battle the pirate captain who was so evil that Hell itself spat him back out. They say you killed the blighter, and thereby seized the captaincy of _The Black Pearl_. That's the legendary cursed ship that's been plundering the seas for ten years. As captain, you claim the captain's share of her treasure, the fabulous treasure of the Isla de Muerta . . . not a seaman's share mind you, but the captain's share! They say, that this share has made you wealthier than anyone could ever imagine."

"That's what they say?" Jack and the three serving wenches were all out on the owner's private, seaside balcony of a tavern called The Devil's Playground. Jack had recently purchased The Devil's Playground and had also purchased the largest villa on the Isle of Tortuga. "There's not a word of truth to that. I'd swear on a stack of Bibles. Now luvs, go and fetch me breakfast."

The three serving wenches simultaneously curtseyed, causing all of their bosoms to bob enticingly. That wasn't fair. Six bouncing boobies, and Jack had only two eyes to ogle them with. It was an impossible task. The women turned and sashayed off to get his breakfast.

From inside The Devil's Playpen came the sounds of growls, vicious blows, crashes, kicks, yowls, shattering furniture and curses as the never-ending brawl continued. Most taverns hired muscle-bound bully boys to keep the peace. But why spend all that extra money on their salaries, when everybody inside was having such a lovely time?

A chair shattered glass as it came sailing out of a window, flew passed Jack, and fell into Cayona Bay below.

In the east, the sky had turned into a brilliant swirl of rose and yellow as dawn quickly approached. Overhead, seagulls mewed as they searched for their own breakfasts out in Cayona Bay.

Jack sat back, anticipating his breakfast of steak and eggs, golden brown toast with freshly churned butter and guava jam, some assorted fruit, juice of mango and (right off a prize ship from the Spanish Main) coffee, steaming hot with rich cream and pure cane sugar. After breakfast, he'd head back to his palatial villa where he'd get himself a good night's . . . er, he glanced over at the approaching dawn . . . a good day's sleep.

Life couldn't get any better.

A coconut-sized ball trailing what looked like a sparkling pixie wand soared out the window and bounced across the balcony towards Jack. Normally, he'd have yelled, "Grenade!" but there was nobody else to yell it to, and there was no sense yelling it at himself because he already knew what it was.

Jack shrieked, toppled over backwards in his chair, rolled until he came up against the railing, heaved himself up over the railing and plummeted down into Cayona Bay. He swam downwards as far as he could.

A thunderous explosion shook the world, and the sea above him turned orange, and red, a violet, and white.

Someone had tried to kill him!

Who would want him dead? Well, there was . . . He started making a list in his mind. It was a rather long list, and he was starting to run out of air, so he'd continue the list later. He made one final look around before heading back to the surface.

A huge, white shark was charging at him, its mouth wide open, its teeth coming at him like a million jagged daggers. The next thing he knew, he'd punched the shark in the nose. The startled beastie turned to swim away, but "away" seemed to be an excellent direction to go, and so Jack grabbed its tail.

As a general rule, sharks don't like people hanging onto their tails, and so the monster shook it violently from side to side as it swam. But Jack was desperate and, at that moment, not all the king's horses, or all the king's men could separate Jack from his reluctant rescuer. He held on for dear life!

But there was that whole "air" situation. Jack's lungs went from being slightly uncomfortable, to becoming extremely concerned, to being desperate, to screaming _air-give-us-air_! He finally let go of the shark's tail, and it fled. Jack fled upwards to the surface of the bay and then, gasping, towards the shore. There were a few fish in the area, but they didn't hang around either.

Jack flailed through the water. His breath shrieked in-and-out of his nearly asphyxiated chest as his brain screamed, _Someone tried to kill me! Someone tried to kill me! Someone tried to kill me! _


	2. Sharing a Bottle of Rum

**Chapter 2: Sharing a Bottle of Rum; Jack Sparrow is Dead; A Disobedient Parrot; Christian Salvation; Strange Rope; An Unordered Fall; Lost Eyeball**

Captain Jack Sparrow dragged himself out of Cayona Bay.

Mr. Gibbs, Cotton and Cotton's parrot were sitting nearby on a beam of timber and were passing a bottle of rum back and forth. (Well not Cotton's parrot, for he was a notorious teetotaler.)

"Awk!"

Mr. Gibbs asked, "Out for a morning swim, Captain?"

"Someone tried to kill me!"

"Do tell. Well, it wasn't us. We've been right here."

Cotton the mute didn't say anything.

His parrot said, "Shiver me timbers. Awk!"

"Rum, Captain?"

Jack took the bottle from Gibbs and guzzled some. "Thanks, I needed that! Someone tried to kill me."

"Awk!"

"Why would anyone want to kill me?"

"Would you like me to compile you a list, Captain? I could have an initial draft to you by, say, this evening."

"I'm a loveable person."

"Awk, walk the plank."

Jack sat down heavily next to Cotton and his parrot. He offered the bird the rum bottle, but Cotton's parrot steadfastly looked the other way. "Beg pardon, I forgot." He handed the rum to Cotton.

A trio of pirates whom they'd never seen before went running down the street. "Jack Sparrow is dead!" they shouted. "Jack Sparrow is dead!"

"Captain, they says you're dead." Gibbs took a swig and handed the bottle back to Cotton.

Jack felt his body for wounds. "I'm pretty sure they're wrong. Do I look dead to you?"

"I don't think so, Captain. You're walking and talking and drinking. Those are all pretty good signs."

Jack got the bottle back from Cotton. "You think we should follow those men?"

Gibbs shook his head. "I'm too drunk."

Jack nodded. "And I'm going to be too drunk real soon."

Cotton fell over backwards and began snoring.

His parrot took wing and flew off in the same general directions as the pirates.

Jack shouted. "Report back if you find out anything!" Who was he trying to kid? That bloody parrot never followed orders.

Sometime later, Ragetti and Pintel atop Jack's ornate, gilded carriage trotted along the seaside road. Ragetti pulled back on the reins. "Isn't that the Captain?"

"Aye, and Mr. Gibbs and Cotton too."

"It is!"

"Why do you suppose they're sleeping there?"

Ragetti shook his head knowingly. "Demon rum."

"Don't be so sanctimonious. You've had a drink or two in your lifetime."

"Not since we've become mortal again. Now, we need to see to the salvation of our immortal souls."

"We can't leave them lying dead drunk where everyone can see them. It's bad for our reputation. We need to gather them up and tote them home."

"I suppose so." Ragetti steered the carriage over next to the three unconscious men. He and Pintel climbed down and hoisted each of them into the carriage. Then they found the half-drunk carton of rum. There were still six unopened bottle in it. "Swill of the Devil himself," sneered Ragetti.

"Good, then I'll take it all," said Pintel, reaching for the carton.

"No, I must save you from yourself. I'll drink half."

"That's mighty Christian of you. I hope God's watching."

"Oh, He has to be," said Ragetti, grinning. "It's the law or something."

They loaded the rum into the carriage and then headed out of town. They left the main road at the turn off and headed up the steep hill where a series of heart-pounding switchbacks would take them up to the top of the cliff and to Jack's sprawling new villa which overlooked the town and Cayona Bay.

The journey was never an easy one, but after awhile . . .

"Ah! The bridge! I, for one, am always happy to see this bridge," sighed Pintel. "It means we're almost home."

"I, for two, am always happy to see it," agreed Ragetti.

A swift-moving river ran beneath a log bridge just before the river leaped out into sheer nothingness and plummeted hundreds of feet down in a spectacular waterfall.

"What's that rope doing there?"

"What rope?"

Ragetti pointed. "There." A thick rope led to one end of the bridge.

"Dunno. Never seen it there before."

"Strange."

"Most strange."

Pondering what the rope might be for, the two men rode the coach up onto the bridge. With a mighty twang, the rope was pulled taut, and it yanked away the far base beam of the bridge. The logs of the bridge gathered together in a bunch, and the coach was unceremoniously heaved into the river. The horses bucked and neighed, but they were being swept along with the coach towards the precipice.

Ragetti and Pintel had been flung into the river. They immediately realized their peril and began swimming mightily for the riverbank. But the current was far too strong, and they also were swept inexorably towards the falls.

The coach went over first, backwards, drawing the team of shrieking horses after it. Then went Ragetti and Pintel, also shrieking.

The noise awoke Captain Jack Sparrow, who stuck his head out of one of the coach windows and asked, "Why are we falling?"

The coach landed backside-first in the small lake at the base of the falls. The tongue of the coach snapped like a rotten toothpick, throwing the screaming and kicking horses to one side. Ragetti just missed landing on the coach as he plummeted into the lake. Pintel just missed the coach, Ragetti and the screaming and kicking horses, as he too plunged into the lake.

Jack again stuck his head out the window. "I'm the captain, and I distinctly remember not ordering any falling."

The horses, in the panic, tore their harnesses apart. They found their footing in the shallows, and still whinnying, fled into the streets of the nearby town.

Pintel was treading water. "Ragetti! Ragetti! Are you all right?"

"I've lost my eyeball!"

"Your real one or your wooden one?"

"My wooden one."

"That's all right then. We can get you a new one."

"But I need _that_ one. Ah! Never mind. Found it!"


	3. HMS Spectre

**Chapter 3: **_**H.M.S. Spectre**_**; A Treacherous Ninja; Cerulean Eyes; Midshipman Middleton Reporting; A Deadly Roll of Parchment; Ensign Evers Reporting; Was That Jack Sparrow I Saw? **

Commodore James Norrington stood off the coast of Tortuga aboard the third-rate ship-of-the-line _H.M.S. Spectre_, 52, and studied the town through his spyglass. "Most odd."

"Sir?"

"A coach-and-four just went over the top of that waterfall."

"Sir!"

"If I weren't absolutely sure that it was filled with pirates, it would have been a most terrible sight."

"Aye, sir."

A half dozen royal marines escorted a figure dressed all in black across the main deck to the base of the ladder leading up to the quarterdeck. They halted there while the figure in black ascended and crossed to Commodore Norrington.

"Sir?" Lt. Cmdr. Gillette motioned to the silent figure.

Norrington turned. "Ah!" He surveyed the newcomer. Black blouse, black trousers, black boots, black gloves, black cloak, black hood, strips of black cloth drawn across the face, and even the flesh around the eyes had been darkened with charcoal. "Good. Let me explain what is happening. Have you ever been to the Japans?"

The head of the figure moved left and then right.

"Of course not. Well, they have there a league of professional assassins called 'ninjas'. These assassins are silent, ruthless and deadly. I have dressed you like this because," Norrington smiled grimly, "you are to be my ninja. Take a dinghy, row over to the town, locate Captain Jack Sparrow, and murder him. Understood?"

The head of the figure moved up and down.

"He has on his person, a compass. You are to obtain it and bring it to me. Do not be distracted if it appears not to work; that is of no importance to this mission. Bring it to me. If you are captured, you are to reveal nothing, not even under the most brutal torture. Is that understood?"

The dark figure thought about this, then kicked Commodore Norrington in his sweet breads, turned and fled.

For the second time this morning, Captain Jack Sparrow staggered onto shore. A slender, firm hand took his wrist and guided him a few steps inland. He wiped the streaming water from his face and looked up into the most gorgeously cerulean eyes he had ever seen. "Hello, luv."

"I know you," the dazzling young woman replied. "You're that Jack Sparrow fellow, ain't ye? The one with all the money?"

"It's Captain Jack Sparrow, luv, Captain."

"Oooooh, a captain are you? And handsome to boot! Come over to my place, darlin', and we'll get you out of those wet clothes. I got a nice fire which will dry you right off."

Mr. Gibbs, Cotton, Pintel and Ragetti waded to shore after him. "Thankee miss. A warm fire sounds real good right now."

"Who are you? Go find your own fire. There's only room in my little cabin for me and Jack." She pulled him over into a nearby cabin and closed the door.

Lt. Cmdr. Gillette said, "Midshipman Middleton's landing party reporting, sir."

The commodore turned.

The painfully young midshipman, still wearing his pirate disguise, saluted. "Morning, sir. I beg to report that Captain Jack Sparrow is dead. We blew him up with a grenade, sir."

"You blew him up? And what about the compass?"

"Sorry sir, but it was lost in the explosion. Everything was completely shattered and/or vaporized, sir. But we got Captain Sparrow. That was the important thing, wasn't it sir?"

"No," sneered Norrington barely able to keep his temper. "It was an important thing, but the important thing was to BRING ME THAT COMPASS!"

Now that the clothes of Captain Jack Sparrow were hung out on a line in front of the one-room cottage's fire, he had no place to put his compass. He shifted it uneasily from one hand to the other. The windows of the tiny cottage had no glass, and the light of dawn streamed in through the opening. He looked over to the wench with the cerulean blue eyes. "You know my name. What's yours?"

She came over and stood before him. "Dorée."

Jack put his compass on a nearby table next to a roll of parchment and began unbuttoning her blouse. "Well, Dorée," he purred. "You seemed to have gotten a little wet yourself. We need to take your clothes off too."

"Would you like some rum"? she asked.

Jack stopped in mid-button. "Er, rum?" He gazed with forlorn lust at her partially unbuttoned blouse, but the siren's song of rum proved too strong for him. His hands trembled as they left her button. "Rum would be very nice."

Her partially unbuttoned blouse retreated with her to the far side of the room to take two glasses and a bottle of rum out of a cabinet.

As Jack waited, he toyed with the parchment which was next to his compass. He unrolled it and noticed it bore his picture. Literature was not Jack's strong suit, but he did know enough reading to make out the words: "Wanted: Dead or Alive! Jack Sparrow. Reward: ₤10,000."

Jack grimaced. "That's Captain Jack Sparrow."

Dorée turned back towards him. But instead of having two glasses of rum in her hands, she held a butcher knife. And the pointy end was pointed right at Jack. There was murder in her cerulean blue eyes.

Jack screamed and jumped naked out the window.

Lt. Cmdr. Gillette said, "Ensign Evers's landing party reporting, sir."

The commodore turned.

The stern, non-nonsense face of the ensign stared fiercely back at him. The young officer saluted. "Morning, sir. I beg to report that Captain Jack Sparrow is dead. We tipped his coach-and-four over a cliff, sir."

"So _you_ killed him. But what about the compass?"

"Sorry sir, but it was lost when the coach went over the cliff and fell into a lake at the bottom. But we got Captain Sparrow. That was the important thing, wasn't it sir?"

"No," sneered Norrington again. "It was an important thing, but the important this was to BRING ME THAT COMPASS!"

The ninja crept from shadow to shadow of the houses just landward from the docks. Concealment would have been made so much easier if it were now night. On the other hand, now that the sun was up, almost everyone on Tortuga was sleeping off the night before, and so it might just be possible to slip through the streets unnoticed. Snoring rippled out of virtually every house the ninja passed.

The question was now, how to locate Jack Sparrow in this sprawling port. The streets were a tangle of often multistory boarding houses, inns, taverns, and houses. Interspersed among them were huts, cottages, shacks, lean-tos, and an occasional tent. How could anyone hope to find Jack Sparrow and his accursed compass in this endless hodgepodge? It was impossible!

Screaming, stark naked, and wildly waving his silly compass in front of him, Jack Sparrow ran right passed the ninja and disappeared again into the tangle of houses.


	4. High Society

**Chapter 4: High Society; A Mid-Air Flip Makes the Case for Chastity; Early-Morning Daiquiris; A Tale of Two Ropes; Keeping an Eye on Cleavage **

The Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga was holding its first ever meeting. They met around a table of freshly baked Danish and hot Chinese tea.

The self-appointed chairwoman glared at her members. "The reason that I scheduled this meeting for just after dawn is because, in my opinion, if we are to succeed in our task to improve the quality of society here on Tortuga, we need ladies who believe in early-to-bed-and-early-to-rise. However, by the looks of most of your, you are just now on your way home to bed rather than coming from it."

"Five will get you ten that you're right."

"And this society abhors gambling!" snapped the chairwoman.

"Hic."

"As much as it abhors consumption of alcoholic spirits!"

The hiccupper looked offended. "But the lad was so shy," she protested. "I just had to get us both drunk, so he'd make his move."

"And we're against fornication! We are a society which embraces chastity!"

The women looked shocked. Murmurs of "chastity?" tiptoed around the group. "Nobody said nuffin' about no chastity." The ladies each tied to figure out how to make a discrete exit without being noticed.

Just then, Captain Jack Sparrow came leaping over the hedge. Or at least, he tried to. His hands and head caught the top of the hedge, he did a mid-air flip, and he landed splat on his still-quite-naked back right in the middle of the Danish. Laying there spread eagled, he tried to catch his breath.

"Oooh, _that _chastity!"

"Now that I think of it, chastity sounds quite good."

"Oh yes, wouldn't think of nuffin' else."

The sound of running boot steps came closer.

Captain Jack Sparrow struggled to his feet and took off at a gallop. A moment later, a sword-wielding ninja burst through the hedge and took out after him. A moment after that, slutty Dorée with a butcher knife in her hand and her blouse halfway unbuttoned burst through the hedge and ran off after the other two. Lastly, came Cotton's parrot, winging swiftly and crying out, "Dead men tell no tales!"

Mr. Gibbs, Cotton, Ragetti and Pintel were quite fortunate in the quick recovery the four escaped horses. However, they were completely unsuccessful in finding the captain. Dorée's cabin was empty, and other than his still drying clothes, there was no sign of him anywhere. Jack's ornate coach was a total loss, smashed to smithereens with the wooden pieces floating in the lake and the rest sunk to the bottom.

So the four men rode the horses up to Jack's cliff-top villa, put them in the stable, trudged into the main house, accepted frozen daiquiris from the butler and went out onto the patio to commiserate and to plan their next move.

Mr. Gibbs looked at the drink in his hand. "Does anyone know why we're being served frozen daiquiris the first thing in the morning?"

"I ordered them." At the patio table sat a spindling little man with pince-nez glasses and a thread-bare suit. His lips were pressed so tightly together, they appeared to be non-existent. He toasted them with his daiquiri.

Mr. Gibbs and the others approached. "And you are?"

"Mr. Haig. Mr. Leighton Northcliff Haig of the Greater Tortuga and Cayona Bay Banking & Trust Company. I was led to believe that Jack Sparrow would be arriving with you."

"That's Captain Jack Sparrow," grumbled Mr. Gibbs. "And aye, he was supposed to be arriving with us, but unfortunately, the captain is lost."

"This is DREADFUL news!" wailed Mr. Haig. "He's dead?"

"No, no. Not 'dead' so much as just, er 'misplaced'."

"I, I, I don't understand."

"No one knows where to find him."

A voice floated across the patio. "I do." Marty the midget was peering over the short retaining wall with a spyglass and down at the village below. "I mean, it sort of looks like the captain, stark naked, being chased by a ninja, a lady with her blouse half unbuttoned, various other people, and a parrot."

Mr. Haig frowned. "Why would a parrot be chasing the captain? That just doesn't make any sense."

The men hurried over to where Marty was, looked down, and indeed saw Captain Sparrow.

"Get a rope," Mr. Gibbs ordered Ragetti, "and throw it down to him."

"Aye, aye," chirped Ragetti and he took off like a flash, was back like a flash, and, like a flash, hurled to rope over the side.

"Interesting approach," mused Mr. Gibbs. "Now, fetch another rope, throw it down to the captain, but this time, hold on to one end."

Captain Jack Sparrow had run out of running room. He'd come up against the cliff face and was now at a dead end (the emphasis being on the word "dead"). He turned to face the pursuing ninja.

When the ninja saw Jack's predicament, the assassin's sword blade practically danced with glee.

Jack knew he could have put up a pretty good fight if only he'd had a sword instead of this bloody compass.

Then a plummeting coil of rope flattened the ninja.

Jack was surprised. He hadn't really counted on being saved by a plummeting coil of rope. He went over and prodded the prone figure with his toe, but there was no movement. He turned and looked upwards along the cliff face as a second rope snaked down towards him.

Mr. Gibbs and a bunch of his mates were looking down from above. "Climb!" they shouted. "Climb!"

At that moment, Dorée came running up with the butcher knife still in her hand.

Jack gripped the thong of the compass with his teeth and used both hands to climb the second rope as fast as he could.

Dorée ran over. She put the butcher knife between her teeth and began climbing up the rope after him.

Pintel looked over the side and shook his bald head. "This doesn't look good. She's gaining on him."

"Don't worry," said Ragetti. "I have a plan."

Cotton gave him a dubious look but said nothing.

"You see how the young lady's blouse is hanging open?"

Mr. Gibbs nodded. "I think it's a safe bet to say that all of us noticed that."

"Well then, let's say a dollop of frozen daiquiri were to fall from a great height and to land in her exposed cleavage? What do you think that would do to her rope-climbing abilities?"

Pintel nodded. "I'd think they'd shatter like the hull of a vessel washed up onto a rocky shore."

"She'd let go of the rope and fall like a stone," Mr. Gibbs agreed.

Ragetti grinned. "Observe." He leaned far out over the precipice to line up the shot. It wasn't an easy one because Jack was swaying between Ragetti and his target. This would take careful timing. "Akkkk!"

Ragetti's wooden eye fell out of its socket. It plummeted down, down, down and landed with a plop right in the center of Dorée's cleavage.

She yelped in surprise and glanced down to see what it was. Many were the times that eyeballs gazed down into her cleavage, but this was the first time, one had looked back up. Dorée shouted, let go of the rope, and fell like a rock.


	5. What the Chicken Said

**Chapter 5: What the Chicken Said; A Most Charming Banker; Request for a Two-Headed Snake; Jar of Air; ****Who in Here Hates Captain Jack Sparrow? Crimp Overboard! Jack's Opinion on the Efficacy of Prayer.**

Anamaria had just killed and plucked a chicken. Now, she cut off it feet, sliced it open, a pulled out its entrails. She dumped to gory mess on a nearby plate by the severed head. As Anamaria began to turn her attention back to the chicken, something caught her eye. She looked again at the chicken's entrails, pondered a moment, and then panicked.

She wiped her bloody hands on a cloth, grabbed her spyglass and ran to the nearby church. It was Sunday morning, and so the pews were empty. She ran to the bell tower door, flung it open, and pounded up the stairs to the top. A magnificent view lay before her. Anamaria extended her spyglass and scanned the sea. But the morning mist had not yet been burned away. Any ship which was lurking out there would be able to see the island but would remain invisible itself.

But then she saw it: a British ship-of-the-line! It was far bigger than anything the pirates of Tortuga had. Wait! The entrails had told her three ships. Three! And they lay cloaked in mist, waiting for any pirate ship unlucky enough to set out this morning.

She turned her spyglass to the harbor below. The ship which was the most prepared to sail was the _Black Pearl._

"My jar of air," Anamaria murmured to herself. "I need my jar of air." 

Helping hands pulled Jack up over the short retaining wall which ran along the top of the cliff and onto his patio. The men laughed and growled with triumph and happily pounded Jack on his back. Then Jack spotted the little man from the bank.

"Mr. Haig?"

"Good morning, Captain Sparrow."

"Pardon my attire, mate. Usually I don't do not dress like this until _after_ I've met with my bankers."

"Droll, Captain Sparrow, quite droll."

"You look as if you're a bearer of bad news."

"That is something," responded Mr. Haig with a morose shrug, "at which I excel."

"I see."

"When you purchased this residence along with a certain business establishment known as 'The Devil's Playground,' you did so using large advances from the Greater Tortuga and Cayona Bay Banking & Trust Company. You were to make monthly payments on those advances . . . beginning two days ago. However, we have as yet received no such payment."

"I've been, uh, distracted."

"You've been inebriated."

"Aye. That too."

"I've been charged by my employers to tell you that if the Greater Tortuga and Cayona Bay Banking & Trust Company does not receive the immediate payment, we will have no option but to begin foreclosure proceedings."

"Immediate payment," echoed Jack. "Wait one moment." Jack went into the house and came back out with a paperweight, which he handed to Mr. Haig.

The banker examined it. The object had a heavy metallic base which was topped by a walnut-sized sapphire sphere. The blue sapphire was obviously met to represent the oceans of the world because over the surface of the sphere, golden mesh had been arranged into a rough approximation of the continents. Haig pulled out a jeweler's loupe and examined the paperweight more closely.

"Well mate," Jack asked, "what do you think?"

"Captain, the contracts you signed clearly state that payment is to be made in specie, to wit, gold or silver coin. However, I believe I'm safe in saying that, if in the future, you should wish to make a payment using treasure of this quality and quantity, the Greater Tortuga and Cayona Bay Banking & Trust Company will be most happy to accept it, most happy indeed. Good day, sir."

"Good day back at you."

Mr. Haig, humming, most happily departed.

"A charming gentleman, don't you think?" asked Jack.

"He's a squirming little leach," sneered Mr. Gibbs.

"But charming."

Cotton's parrot fluttered down onto the old man's shoulder.

"Anything to report?"

The parrot flapped its wings one final time. "Awk."

"I thought not. Mr. Gibbs, I will retire briefly to put on some clothes. When I return, I'd be most obliged if my two-headed snake were waiting for me."

"Uh, because you adore the little reptile and you wish to spend more time with him?"

"No," said Jack, "because I wish to take him on a sea cruise."

"Um, because you wish to take him on a sea cruise to the Isla de Muerta, so's we can bring back another load of treasure and thereby restore our depleted funds?"

"No. A sea cruise and then a river cruise."

"Oh dear."

Anamaria had commandeered the gravedigger's rusty shovel and was frantically digging in the church's graveyard – not in the consecrated ground where the parishioners themselves were buried, but rather on the other side of the fence, in the little graveyard, where their pets, noble steeds, etc. were inhumed.

She struck wood and used the shovel blade to scrape way the loose dirt from a foot-and-a-half long coffin. She wrestled it out of the grave and up onto the ground. Then she pried open the lid.

Inside, was a large, wide-mouthed jar filled only with air.

Anamaria seized the jar and ran back to her cottage. She momentarily set the jar of air down, pulled out two bottles of rum, opened them both, took out a small bottle of vile-looking blackish liquid, took a large swing out of both bottles of rum, refilled them using the vile-looking blackish liquid, and corked them again. Then she tossed the half-butchered chicken out the window for stray dogs to feast on; scribbled a short note; took the note, the one bottle of rum, and her sack of emergency doubloons back to the church where she left them. She ran back to her cottage, grabbed the remaining bottle of rum and the jar of air, and raced a nearby tavern. "Who in here hates Captain Jack Sparrow?"

A half dozen hands went up. A giant, dark-skinned bosun stood up and up and up. Anamaria recognized him as one of the mutineers who'd marooned Jack . . . twice. "I really hate him."

"Good. You men, come with me!"

The able seaman known as Crimp was in charge of the few crewmen who watched over the _Black Pearl_ while she was in port. He was surprised to see Anamaria and the bosun leading a small group of half-drunken sailors towards the ship. He met them as they came off the gangplank.

"How can I help you, miss?"

She turned to the bosun. "Toss these men overboard. Then prepare to cast off."

There was no need for the bosun to relay that order. The half-drunken sailors fell upon the handful of guards and began wrestling them towards the railing.

Anamaria turned and went back down to the dock to where two boys were watching the fight and laughing. She held out a doubloon. "Want it?"

One of the boys nodded.

"To earn it, you need to do two things. First, when Captain Jack Sparrow gets here, tell him he needs to pay you another doubloon if he wants to know how to get his ship back. Can you do that?"

The boy nodded.

"Second, after he pays you that doubloon, tell him he must go to church." She pointed. "That church. Understand?"

He nodded again. She gave him her doubloon, patted him on the head, and went back up the gangplank along with her jar of air and bottle of rum.

The last of Crimp's crew were being tossed over the side. Lines were being cast off. Sails were being raised. The _Black Pearl_ began inching its way away from the dock and towards the harbor mouth, beyond which a squadron of British warships lay in wait.

Captain Jack Sparrow and his crew rode up, two on each horse. He pulled up sharply when he saw the _Black Pearl_ sailing away and saw the men he'd left to guard it foundering in the bay.

"They're stealing my ship!" He leapt from his horse and ran to the pier. "Ahoy, _Black Pearl_!"

On the quarterdeck, Anamaria turned. "Ahoy, Captain Jack Sparrow!"

"You're stealing my ship!" he shouted (just in case she hadn't noticed).

"Not 'stealing,' Captain!" she shouted back. "Borrowing.' Borrowing without permission . . . but with every intention of returning her to you."

"Those are just fancy words for 'stealing,' luv!"

She saluted him and turned back to her duties.

Jack felt a tug on his coat. He looked down to see a boy.

"I can tell you how go get your ship back, but you have to give me a doubloon first."

"Says who?"

"Says her."

"Her?" Suddenly Jack understood. He pointed at the departing ship. "Her 'her'?"

"Huh?"

Jack's usual method of dealing with small children was to kick and punch them until they went away. But this seemed to be one of those exceptions that proved the rule. So he dug out a doubloon and gave it to the boy.

The lad grinned. Two doubloons in one day. How lucky could a kid get? He pointed, "You need to go to church."

The pirate frowned. "I tried that, kid. Prayer doesn't work. Give me my doubloon back."

The two boys turned and ran away as fast as they could.


	6. Norrington's Ambush

**Chapter 6: Norrington's Ambush; That's Witchcraft, That Is; Captain Jack Sparrow Goes to Church. **

"Commodore Norrington!" cried Lt. Cmdr. Gillette, "the _Black Pearl's_ making a run for it! Just as you predicted, sir!"

"Wither away?"

"There sir!"

Norrington nodded. "Signal the _Last Trump_ and the _Jaguar_ to intercept.

"Aye, sir!" 

The _Black Pearl_ nosed her way cautiously out of Cayona Bay and headed slowly south. The winds were sluggish this morning.

Then the morning mist began to rise.

"Sail ho!" came the cry for the crow's nest.

The bosun bellowed up. "What heading!"

"Forty degrees off the starboard bow! Second sighting: five degrees off the starboard bow! Third sighting: fifty degrees off the port bow! British warships! All of them!"

The bosun backhanded Anamaria. "You stupid cow! You've led us into a trap! You've killed us all!"

She struggled to recover from her eyeballs rattling around in their sockets. "False, true, false," she replied. "No, I am neither stupid nor a cow. Yes, I have led us into a trap. No, we are not going to die today. 'Why?' you ask, as well you may. Because . . . I have a jar of air."

He looked at her dubiously.

She shouted, "Hard a port to 150 degrees! Load cannon with chain shot!"

"You cannot fight, captain! There are three of them, and look at the wind! We can barely maneuver!"

"Behold," Anamaria said calmly, and she twisted the lid on her wide-mouthed jar.

Nothing.

She twisted it again. It still wouldn't budge. She twisted again and again and again, and nothing and nothing and nothing. She tried with all her might, but this was like trying to twist the top of a granite rock. She fell to one knee, rapped the jar lid repeated on the deck, and then tried again. And failed again. She stood up, sighed a sigh of total defeat, and handed the jar to the bosun.

He applied his herculean strength, and the lid slid free.

Anamaria snatched the jar back from him. She said again, "Behold!" as she unscrewed the lid the rest of the way. There was a mighty whistle of wind, and the heretofore limp sails billowed out beautifully. The _Black Pearl_ shot forward.

"Ahoy captain!" cried the lookout in the crow's nest. He was pointing dead ahead. "It's the frigate _H.M.S. Jaguar_! She's rolling out her guns, preparing to give us a broadside!"

Anamaria saw the danger. "Hard a starboard!"

Before the crew could even react, the _Black Pearl_ began coming about.

"Fire!"

The guns of the _Black Pearl_ roared, and the chain shot scythed through the _Jaguar_'s masts and rigging, which then toppled down onto the crew below.

Anamaria surveyed the crippled _Jaguar_, and saw that both the _Last Trump_ and the _Spectre_ were far out or range and, with their limp sails, were falling even farther behind. "Make all sail!" cried Anamaria. "Ease off to port. Sail 120 degrees!"

The ship swung around and headed off towards Haiti. The bosun looked up at her full sails, glanced over at the luffing sails of the two British ships-of-the-line and muttered, "That's witchcraft, that is."

Anamaria rounded on him. "Do you have a problem with that?"

The huge bosun shook his head, "No Captain, not if it means I'm still alive at the end of the day."

"Good," she snapped. Then she popped open the bottle of rum and handed it to him. "Time to celebrate, I think. Have a generous swig and see to it that every one of the crew has one too. A generous swig." 

"You aren't actually going in there, are you Captain?"

Jack stood poised at the top of the steps leading up to the church, one hand on the doorknob. He couldn't make himself move any further. "Anamaria says if we want the _Pearl_ back, we have to go in." Still, he didn't move.

"But Captain! It'sa, it'sa, it'sa . . !"

"Look on the bright side," Jack rationalized. "Last night was Saturday night. No one will have sobered up yet, and so no one will see us."

"But still, Captain . . ."

Jack's nose twitched. It twitched again. It twitched a third time. "There's rum," he announced. He threw open the door and hurried inside.

Hesitantly, the crew followed.

"Wipe your feet! Wipe your feet!" Mr. Gibbs growled at them. "What, were you raised in a barn?"

"Well yes I was. Is that a crime?"

Jack went straight to the bottle of rum, popped it open, took a swig and sunk happily into a nearby pew.

Mr. Gibbs sat down next to him with the note Anamaria had left. "It says here that each of us is to take at least one large swig of the rum," he said, reading the note, "but under no circumstances, are we to touch the money."

Jack took another swig and handed to bottle to Gibbs. He then cocked an eyebrow. "Money?"


	7. ThreeEyed Strumpet

**Chapter 7: Three-Eyed Strumpet; A Desperate Search; Ragetti Triumphant; A Larcenous Monkey; What to do When a Skinny Pirate Grabs Your Bosom; The Mouth of the River Tethys;**** Things in the Dark****. **

Ragetti, with the ship's monkey hanging onto his shoulder, hurried through the town to the bottom of the cliff just below Jack's villa. When he got there, he found the following: a coil of rope but no ninja, Dorée with a broken leg and partially opened blouse sitting on a large boulder as she awaited the donkey cart which would take her to the hospital, most of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga who were milling about uselessly, and a handful of townsfolk who'd been on their way home to sleep off the effects of Saturday night but who had been attracted by all the hubbub.  
>Ragetti went over and sat down by Dorée. "'Scuse me, miss," he mumbled. The monkey on his shoulder chittered.<p>

"'Scuse you? For what?"

"Um, I, I, I . . ."

"You, you, you . . ?"

"'Scuse me," he said again and then stuffed his hand down into her cleavage, feeling around for his lost eyeball.

"I beg your pardon! Awk! Awk! Help, help! I'm being assaulted! Help!"

Most of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga who'd been milling about uselessly came running over to her rescue, accompanied by the handful of drunken townsfolk who'd found to their delight ever more hubbub.

"Ah there!" Ragetti pulled the eyeball from her cleavage and triumphantly held it aloft for all to see.

The self-appointed chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga took one look at the eyeball and fainted dead away.

The ship's monkey climbed up Ragetti's triumphant arm, seized the eyeball from his fingers, jumped down to the ground, and leaped up onto the bosom of the chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga, where it tried to chew on the wooden eye.

The chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga came to, found a monkey sitting on her bosom and gnawing on an eyeball, and she fainted dead away again.

Ragetti screamed in outrage and despair. He made a dive for the monkey, which took off running, and Ragetti came up with nothing but twin handfuls of the chairwoman's bosom.

The chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga came to yet again and found a one-eyed pirate with his hands clutching her bosom. She said, "Oh my," thought about her situation, then seized the scrawny pirate, dragged him to her lips, and gave him a big, wet, sloppy kiss. So much for chastity. 

"Up, up, up, you scurvy dogs," growled Anamaria, as she strode around the deck of the _Black _Pearl by torchlight, kicking the crew awake. "Drop anchor. Reef the sails."

The blurry-eyed men regained consciousness, stumbled to their feet, and rubbing their sleep-filled eyes, hurried off to their work stations. A few of them slowed to a confused halt.

"What are we doing here?"

"MOVE!" bellowed Anamaria.

They moved. Quickly.

The bellow awoke Captain Jack Sparrow, who was sprawled on the quarterdeck. He raised his head, blinked, saw Anamaria kicking his crew awake down on the main deck, glanced over at the moonlit jungle coast, and looked around the ship again. "Avast there, Anamaria!" he cried out. He clambered up to his feet. "Where are we?"

"On board the _Black Pearl_, Captain!"

"I know that," he said. "I know that. It's my ship, so I know that. What I meant was," he pointed at the jungle coast, "where are we?"

"The mouth of the Tethys River. That is where you were going, isn't it?"

Jack recognized it now. "Drop anchor! Reef the sails!" he shouted. "MOVE!"

His crew rushed to comply.

Mr. Gibbs approached warily. "Er Captain, are you sure you want to go through with this? We ain't even there yet, and already, there's witchcraft afoot." He made the sign against evil.

The anchor splashed into the dark waters of the Caribbean, and the _Black Pearl_ halted.

"Ready a longboat," Jack replied.

Anamaria called up. "Have you brought payment?"

"Of course. I've dealt with Tia Dalma before. That's why I brought along a two-headed snake. She'll love it!"

"Er Captain, there is no two-headed snake."

"No two-headed snake?"

"No sir," cringed Mr. Gibbs. "Apparently whatever dark forces brought us here neglected to bring along the snake. It's probably still back there in the church."

Jack grumbled, "That's the trouble with churches. You can never trust them." To Anamaria, he called down, "There's no two-headed snake. But I do have this bag of doubloons."

"You took the bag of doubloons?" she snarled. "That was payment for the crew who actually piloted this ship out of the harbor and who battled the British this morning. I left you specific instructions that you were not to touch that money!"

Jack shrugged. "Pirate." 

The night mist hung heavily over the surface of the River Tethys as the longboat made its way against the sullen current. Near the banks, the eerie gleam of fireflies dipped and wove among the putrid reeds, grasses and trees. Hidden toads croaked out hideous melodies. Globs of moss hung like corpses from overhead branches. Night birds cawed, chuckled, and screeched in the darkness.

"Nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live here."

"Quiet in the boat!" snapped Mr. Gibbs and then, in a softer voice, "Er Captain, maybe it'd be best if we came back tomorrow, when there's a bit more light."

Jack grinned. "You aren't afraid of the dark, are you?"

"No sir," replied Mr. Gibbs. I'm more afraid of the things which are in the dark." He swallowed hard. "And of the things which ain't truly there at all."

The Captain pointed with his chin. "No worries. Anamaria is here. She'll protect you."

Mr. Gibbs groaned. "Aye, sir."

"Shhh!" hissed Anamaria. "We're almost there. It wouldn't do for folks here to know we're coming."

They rounded a last bend and saw a smattering of wooden huts, placed up on stilts high above the waterline. Torchlight caused the front of each hut to glow yellow, and enticing light flickered in the cabin windows.

"Look. There're people on the shore, watching us."

Anamaria spied the human shapes and slowly nodded. "Aye. They _might_ be people. Let us hope so."

The boat tied up at the floating wharf at the bottom of the ladder which led up to Tia Dalma's hut. Jack led the way up the ladder. He waited until everyone had gathered on the porch. "Nothing to worry about, mates," he said. "I'll go in first-"

"No," barked Anamaria, pushing her way to the front. Her jar of air was tucked under one arm. "_I_ will go in first."

"Anamaria will go in first . . ." Before Jack could finish whatever it was he was going to say, Anamaria knocked on the door and, without waiting for an answer, opened it and went inside.

The rest of the group gulped and followed.


	8. Voodoo Priestess

**Chapter 8: Voodoo Priestess; Treasures Spurned; ****Oysters;**** A Good Man.**

The main room of the cabin was filled with the weird. It smelled funny too.

Tia Dalma came out of a back room, her layered clothing looking as they'd been pulled by the handful out of ancient trunks, her disheveled corn-rolled hair hanging limp and dusty on her head, her tattooed lips smiled to show blackened teeth. "Look," she gushed, "Anamaria has brought her friends to play with me."

"Hush up, Dalma," snapped Anamaria. "We here because we need your help."

The voodoo priestess grinned wider. "Do you now? Did you bring payment?"

Jack pushed passed forward to offer the pouch. "Doubloons for you, Tia Dalma, to add to your wealth."

"Doubloons, you say?" She took the pouch, went over to one of the window and shook the contents into the river below. "The fish may have need of them. I do not. I meant did you bring anything of value?"

Anamaria proffered her jar. "I return your jar of air."

Tia Dalma froze. "What are you talking about, you silly girl. Returning a jar of air? Have you lost your senses?"

"We need your help. You demand something of value."

"I do." Tia Dalma's eyes scanned the gathering. "I do not see Seaman Ragetti among your number."

"No, your uh worship," simpered Pintel. "His wooden eye fell into the cleavage of a woman back in Tortuga, and so he stayed behind to fetch it back."

"I see. And Seaman Ragetti, he has much experience with women's cleavages?"

"Uh no, not really, no."

"So he will most likely fail?"

"Uh yes, most likely, your worship."

"I see. So what else do you have to offer?"

Jack asked tentatively, "Do diamonds, rubies and emeralds interest you at all?"

"Do not insult me!"

Crimp tugged on Jack's shirtsleeve. "You can insult me all you want, Captain."

Tia Dalma looked into Jack's eyes. Then her gaze rose to the top of his head. "There is always that piece of eight dangling from your bandanna."

His hand slapped firmly down on it. "No! I need it!" A crocodile grinned slowly stretched across his face. "Besides, I wouldn't want to insult you by offering you a mere coin."

Tia Dalma's eyes darkened. "Then perhaps we can reach no accord."

Anamaria blurted, "I offer you Captain Jack Sparrow!"

Tia Dalma gasped, "What?"

Jack squeaked, "What?"

Mr. Gibbs yanked Jack backwards. "Don't be ridiculous! Tia Dalma wants something of value, and everyone knows that the Captain's totally worthless."

"Aye," the other crewmembers all agreed. 

Ragetti rushed into the Devil's Playground. The sun had just set, and so the tavern's evening beer brawl had not yet begun. He sought out the cook.

"Oysters!" he cried, "I need oysters!"

"My stars, Ragetti," gasped the cook, "you look terrible. Are you okay?"

"Bring me oysters," the skinny pirate whimpered. "Raw, cooked, oyster stew. I don't care."

The cook headed for the kitchen. "Okay, but don't die on me before I get back, okay?"

Ragetti sought out an empty table and sat down trembling.

One of the serving wenches sashayed up. "What can I get you a drink, darlin'?"

"Oysters. Bring me oysters."

"The cook's getting' 'em. Anything to drink?"

The cook shoved the wench aside and plopped down a steaming plate of oysters. "Here ya go."

Ragetti began shoving oysters in his mouth and chewing as fast as he could.

"Slow down, darlin'," said the serving wench. "You're gonna choke yourself."

Ragetti vigorously shook his head and kept cramming oysters into his mouth.

The cook cleared his throat. "Um, what happened to your eye?"

"Mfrpt smonds nsind esns?"

"Your eye. It's missing."

Ragetti's hand flew to his empty eye socket. He swallowed mightily. "That monkey! That accursed monkey!" He started to run from the room, thought better of it, rushed back to the table, shoved the few remaining oysters into his mouth, plopped some doubloons down on the table, and ran out into the night. 

The way Tia Dalma approached Anamaria in the same manner a jungle cat stalks its prey. She hissed, "And of what value is Captain Jack Sparrow?"

Anamaria was unapologetic. "He is a good man!"

Pintel guffawed and then slapped his hands over his mouth.

"Some people might disagree with you," sneered Tia Dalma.

"They would be wrong," insisted Anamaria. "Look at him."

Jack was looking totally mystified. His hesitant smile flashed a tooth, which at first glance, appeared to be gold.

"He voluntarily took on the Curse of Cortez, so he could rescue the Governor Swann's daughter. When he borrowed my boat, with every intention of returning it but failed to do so, he got me another boat, a bigger boat. I was even permitted, for a short while, to captain the _Black Pearl_, his most beloved ship. And . . . he tells the truth."

"But no one ever believes him."

"Is that his fault?"

Tia Dalma regarded Jack coolly. "He is a pirate, a thief, a gambler, a philander, a drunk, and a scallywag."

"Aye," agreed Anamaria. "But without a doubt, he is also the richest and most powerful man in Tortuga."

The tattooed lips again smiled to show black teeth. "Okay. He may have his uses."

"Wait a minute!" protested Jack. "Don't I get a say in this?"

"No."


	9. Nighttime in Tortuga

**Chapter 9: Nighttime in Tortuga; Ragetti Spaghetti is on the Menu; Towel Bearer; The Benefits of Personal Hygiene; Parrots are of No Help Whatsoever; Skinny Dipping Voodoo; Time to Panic. **

Countless drunken sailors careened along the boardwalks of Tortuga, laughing boisterously, arguing loudly and singing off key. Ladies of the evening cruised among them like heavily perfumed sharks. Knots of citizens collected to watch fistfights, knife fights and cockfights (no, the uh kind with chickens). Pistol shots went off at irregular intervals. A very ugly girl danced for doubloons. Street urchins begged. Pickpockets picked pockets. Cutpurses cut purses. A stray dog fled yelping down the street. Cotton's parrot sat on the high ledge of a seedy brothel which overlooked this human maelstrom. "Shiver me timbers."

Ragetti ran out of the Devil's Playground and into the middle of this chaos. He looked this way and that, trying to figure out where he could find the twice-cursed monkey which had stolen his eyeball.

In the distance, he heard the sing-song call of a female voice, "Ragetti Spaghetti? Where are you? Where are you, my handsome love muffin?"

Wherever the monkey was, he had to be in the opposite direction from wherever that dread voice was coming from. So away Ragetti ran. 

Next morning, Tia Dalma led Anamaria and Jack up a jungle path, through trees still dripping with the previous night's rain, to an enchanting sparkling pool fed by a cascading waterfall. Jack had been assigned the job of towel bearer.

"I'm sorry to be the one to have to tell you this, sister," said Tia Dalma, "but you stink. Time for a bath."

"You stink too," retorted Anamaria.

"Aye, so I too shall bathe."

Jack interjected, "And I reek to High Heaven! So I -"

"You shall do no such thing!" snapped Tia Dalma. "You are mine now, and so you must do as I say!"

"Do I?"

"Oh yes. Turn around, hold the towels and be still."

Jack turned his back on the two women. He didn't want to, but he did. He tried turning back, but it was as if he were being held by a giant, invisible hand. He fought against it, but the giant, invisible hand wouldn't budge.

A few moments later, there was a whoop and a splash. Then a second whoop and a second splash.

This was too much for Jack. He spun around - okay, he didn't spin around. Left-left-left-turn-left, right-right-right-turn-right, left-right-left-right-right-right-left-right. He stayed stuck where he was. Then he realized that he didn't need to turn his whole body, just his head. He tried to turn his head. But failed. Head-left-head-left-left-left. Head-right-right. Jack felt as if he were an ant trapped in amber . . . an ant facing the wrong way.

Behind him, the two women laughed and splashed, two (he reminded himself) very naked women.

He shifted the towels until they were balanced on one arm, and then he checked the fingernail on that hand. They were filthy. So he pulled out his dagger and began to clean them. His very shiny and very reflective dagger. If he held it just right . . . Oh yesss! 

Ragetti stumbled through the empty streets of Tortuga. Now that the sun was up, folks had gone home to catch a few hours of desperately needed sleep before yet another night of drunken debauchery. In Ragetti's left hand was a half-drunk bottle of rum. In his right was what hopefully-soon would be a monkey-bashing club.

Cotton's parrot fluttered down and landed on his shoulder. "Awk."

Ragetti suddenly brightened. "Hey! You could fly around and spot that monkey for me, couldn't you?"

The parrot put his head under his wing and went to sleep.

"Wake up!" He prodded the parrot.

"Awk! Stand by to repel boarders!" screeched the parrot, and then he took wing. "Mutiny! Mutiny!" 

"So sister, why do you come here?"

Anamaria answered, "Jack has a problem."

Tia Dalma chuckled, "Jack Sparrow always has a problem."

"People are trying to kill me!" Jack interjected.

"What people?"

"I don't know what people! I didn't ask for names! There're just a lot of them, that's all. Ambushes, assassins, wanted dead-or-alive posters. They're everywhere!"

"And what do you want me to do about it?"

"Tell me who they are. Stop the attacks!"

"Stop the attacks?"

"Yes! Yes, that would do nicely. Stop the attacks. Stop the attacks, and we can all go on our merry ways."

"That will not be free, Captain Jack Sparrow," crooned Tia Dalma. "You must pay a price."

"I've already given you me. What more can I give you."

She laughed. "Oh, that was just a little joke. I don't want to own peoples' bodies. At least, not while they're still alive. Sister, bring me one of the beads from his beard."

"A bead from my beard?"

There was a swirl of water behind him, and then the soft pad of wet feet. Anamaria's hands came around him and started undoing the tangle weave of beard strand that held various beads.

Automatically, Jack's hand slipped around and found a delicious slab of firm back, wet as a frog, slippery as a fish. He slid his hand lower.

"Got it!" cried Anamaria and she dove back into the pool before Jack could reach pay dirt.

"Ah yes, that is fine," murmured Tia Dalma. Now there, over among my clothes, you will find my bag of chicken bones. Bring them to me, please."

The water swirled again.

Jack asked, "What are you doing?" He got no answer.

"Here's the bag of chicken bones."

"Thank you, child. Now, come watch this." More water sloshed.

Jack again demanded to know, "What's going on?"  
>There came a rattle-rattle-rattle and then the pitter-patter of chicken bones and a bead rolling across stone.<p>

"Ah, there," sighed Tia Dalma. "Look at the pattern of those bones and particularly the bead that lies within them. Tell me what you see."

"Well, people are definitely trying to kill Jack. Of that there is no doubt."

Jack snapped, "I could have told you that."

"Particularly this man."

Jack perked up. "What man?"

"A high-ranking military officer."

The pirate made a face. "Norrington?"

"Of course, Commodore Norrington," sneered Anamaria. "Who do you think I fought this morning?"

"Wait a minute! You fought Norrington this morning?"

"That's why I borrowed the _Pearl_. If you'd have taken her out, you'd have been slaughtered. She needed to be commanded by the best sea captain in the Caribbean."

"Wait another minute! I am the best sea captain in the Caribbean."

"No Jack," retorted Anamaria. "I am."

Tia Dalma asked, "Any why do you suppose this bone is lying lie that?"

Anamaria gasped. "Commodore Norrington is bringing his squadron here!"

"No time to waste, sister. We must run!"

"Here!" Jack gasped. He threw the towels up into the air and raced back down the jungle trail to save his ship.


	10. Sail Ho!

**Chapter 10:** **Sail Ho! Choice Number 3; Cat Fight! Revenge of the Thunder Mug; Blow Hard. **

"I feel guilty about leaving the ladies behind, sir," said Mr. Gibbs as he climbed up the ladder to the deck of the _Black Pearl._ Dawn was breaking, giving him ample of light to climb by.

"Had to," replied Jack, who was coming up right behind him. "They chose to waste time by putting their clothes back on. We didn't have time to wait."

A slender hand came down and helped Mr. Gibbs aboard. Tia Dalma smiled her black-teeth smile at him. "Thank you for thinking of us, Mr. Gibbs. You are a true gentleman." He found himself between Tia Dalma and Anamaria.

"How in the world did you get here before us?"

Jack looked equally confused as his head came up over the side.

"Have you forgotten who I am?" Tia Dalma asked. "Or merely forgotten what I can do?"

"Sail ho!" came a cry from up in the crow's nest.

Jack scrambled aboard. "Wither away?"

The lookout pointed, "The_ Last Trump_ is coming up off our stern. The_ Spectre_ is off our larboard quarter!"

Jack spun and began dragging his men up over the side as fast as he could. "Up anchor! Make all sail!"

The men ran to their stations.

Anamaria grinned at the captain. "Two British men-of-war. What do you intend to do?"

"What do I intend? Run away, of course, just as fast and as far as I can!"

She moistened her finger and held it up to test the wind. "But poor Jack, you are in the lee of those palisades and have no wind. They, on the other hand, are scooting passed the lowlands with their sails full. So again I ask: what do you intend to do?"

Jack looked up at his sails as they unfurled and hung limp as a dead goose. He compared them with the billowing sails of the approaching warships. He was outmaneuvered, outgunned, and outmanned. He couldn't run, he dare not trade broadsides, and to board or to be boarded was suicide.

"Rum!" he declared. "I need rum!"

"Rum will not help."

"Rum always helps!"

"You have two choices, Captain Jack Sparrow," Anamaria gloated. "You can fight and be killed, or surrender and be hanged. The choice is yours."

"Then I choose Number 3."

"And what is that?"

"It's a detail I'm working on, luv."

"There is no Choice Number 3, Captain. You are doomed."

"You forget two things, luv. First, I'm Captain Jack Sparrow. And second, for Captain Jack Sparrow, there is always a Choice Number 3."

Gibbs interrupted. "Then the men will be thrice glad to be hearin' it, Captain."

Jacks hands flew to his bandana. "My doubloon! Tia Dalma, I'll trade you my doubloon if you save us!"

"No! You cannot!" shrieked Anamaria. "You know why she wants it!"

Tia Dalma roared. "Shut up!"

"I'll give you my jar of air!" Anamaria continued. "It can save you!"

"Silly girl!" snapped Tia Dalma. "I gave that jar of air to you! And you would give it away?"

"Rather than see Calypso take one step towards freedom? Oh yes I would!" She held out the jar of air to Jack.

Tia Dalma leaped for it. The two women grappled over the jar, spitting and hissing like alley cats. They each had their arms around it and were yanking and pulling.

Suddenly, it squirted free.

Jack leaped for it. He got one hand on it, but that just gave it a slow end-over-end spin. The jar hit the deck and shattered.

۞

Dorée lay in a hospital bed, her leg cast hoisted and tied high in the air. The rum was helping to kill her pain.

A monkey holding an eyeball confidently strolled into the room. It spotted her and chittered. They eyeball somehow looked familiar.

"Ah! There you are!" exclaimed Ragetti, who had appeared outside her glassless window. "Give me back my eye!" He began climbing in through the window.

The monkey shrieked and fled up Dorée's hospital gown.

She yelped.

The monkey's head appeared out of the top of the gown, as Ragetti dove into the bottom of the gown after it.

"You again!" shrieked Dorée. She grabbed her thunder mug and bashed the bulge in her gown which was his head. Ragetti staggered out backwards.

The monkey chittered, scampered out of the gown and over her shoulder, jumped down from the bed and raced out the door.

"Hey! What'd you do with me bloody eyeball?" Ragetti raced over to Dorée, pulled open the top of her gown, and espied the eyeball resting comfortably between her breasts. With a broad grinned, he pulled it out.

Dorée belted him again with her thunder mug. "Stay out from underneath my clothing!" She hit him three more times.

۞

The wind yowled out of the shattered jar of air. It shouldered its way into the ship's sails, which billowed out nicely. The _Black Pearl_ shot ahead like a startled greyhound.

The wind grew, swirling. It charged off across the sea, striking full on to the _Last Trump_, turning her to starboard. The _Spectre_ listed to larboard, twisting aside under the force of the howling wind. The two men-of-war bobbed like bathtub toys in the face of the unexpected onslaught. Sailors scurried aloft to reef the sails before spars and perhaps even masts began to snap.

Anamaria was at the wheel of the _Pearl_. She'd turned the heading over and was heading out to sea, faster than the _Black Pearl_ had ever sailed before.

Mr. Gibbs and the others were making signs to ward off evil, spinning around and trembling.

Jack came up beside her. "What was in that jar?"

Anamaria shrugged. "Just air. But if I were you, I'd reef your sails before it comes back."

Once glance at what was happening to the British told Jack that Anamaria's concerns were well founded. "Topmen!" he bellowed. "Reef those sails! Reef them, I say, or lose them!"

A crashed echoed over the waves.

Jack looked back to see the _Last Trump_ keeling over. She'd been driven onto unseen reefs, and now her masts had snapped, much of her rigging had tumbled to the decks, and many hands had been thrown into the choppy sea. She was a magnificent ship who was dying.

Tia Dalma hissed at Anamaria, "Silly girl, see what you have loosed upon the world!"


	11. The Escape that Wasn't

**Chapter 11: The Escape that Wasn't; Eurus Unbound; Knife of the Ninja; ****Isla de Muerta; Ninja No More. **

Ragetti, with his eyeball in one hand and his other hand on the growing lumps on his skull, dove out of the window of the hospital. Outside, he rolled to a stop in the weeds, spat on his wooden eye to clean it, and then slipped in back into its socket, blinking several times so that it properly seated itself.

The chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga seized his wrists and hoisted him up onto his feet. "Come back to bed darling," she crooned. "I'm getting lonesome there all by myself."

"But I can't!" stammered Ragetti. "I'm a good Christian, and we don't do things like that!"

"Of course you do. Come let me show you."

Cotton's parrot flew overhead, squawking, "Abandon hope! Awk! Abandon hope! Abandon hope!"

۞

A heavy rain lashed the crew of the _Black Pearl_. "What on earth was in that jar?" Jack had to shout at Tia Dalma in order to make himself heard over the shrieking wind.

"Years ago, I imprisoned Eurus in there! He's one of the Amemoi!" she shouted back.

"Oh! Er, what's an Amemoi?"

"A wind god! He thought that with Calypso bound, it would be safe for Him to come and play games with her! I taught Him the errors of his ways!"

"And you gave him to Anamaria?"

Tia Dalma nodded. "Having an imprisoned god at a person's command can come in handy!"

"You gave Him to her, after all we've been to each other?" He stopped shouting when she gave him a look. He could only mutter, "And uh, all we haven't been to each other?"

She turned and walked away from him.

Mr. Gibbs came careening over. "Captain, permission to put another reef in the sails? This blow is approaching gale force!"

"Aye mate, protect the ship." Jack glared at Anamaria, fighting the great wheel with her hair blowing like a medusa and a look of wild exhilaration on her face. "This wind's pure evil."

Poor Mr. Gibbs made yet another sign to ward off evil and ran to give the order.

۞

The lust-crazed chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga dragged the struggling Ragetti back into her house and slammed the door.

Ragetti's eyes grew wide.

A mysterious figure, dressed all in back, shoved aside the chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga and held a razor-sharp knife up against Ragetti's throat. The ninja whispered fiercely, "Where is Captain Jack Sparrow?"

Ragetti's good eye rolled upwards and he fainted dead away.

۞

The _Black Pearl_ fled before the demonic winds which continued to grow behind them. Mr. Gibbs kept an eye on them through a spyglass. "It's a hurricane, that is," he told Jack. "A full-blown, damned-to-Hell hurricane."

"On the bright side," pontificated Jack. "That means that Commodore Norrington won't be following us. No one could sail through that and live."

"But it's catchin' up with us, sir!"

"What is?"

"'What is?' The bleeding hurricane!"

"Catching up with us?"

"Aye, sir!"

"Well, that's not good! Not good at all!"

From the crow's nest came the cry of, "Land ho! Isla de Muerta! It's the Isla de Muerta!"

"Excellent!" exclaimed Mr. Gibbs. "We can shelter the ship behind its steep palisades and take cover ourselves in the caves."

Jack looked ahead to the isle on the horizon and behind him at the towering storm. Why did he get the odd feeling that he was a sheep being driven to slaughter?

**۞**

When Ragetti away, he found himself tied to a chair. He was back-to-back with the chairwoman of the Ladies' Society for the Improvement of the Island of Tortuga, who was also tied to a chair. The ninja, glistening knife in hand, was hovering over him like the Angel of Death.

"Where is Captain Jack Sparrow?" the ninja hissed again.

"How should I know?" whimpered the pirate.

The point of the knife danced in front of Ragetti's one good eye. "Because you're a member of his crew."

"But he didn't tell us where he was going! He just told Mr. Gibbs to get his two-headed snake because he wanted to take it on a little sea cruise."

"Sea cruise?"

"And a, and a, and a river cruise."

"Tia Dalma!"

"Wha..?"

The ninja pulled off her hood to reveal that she was the infamous street walker Giselle, and she flung it on the floor. "That does it!" she snapped. "I give up being a ninja! I don't care was Norrington promised me or what he threatened me with! I'm not messing with Tia Dalma! No, no, no, no, no!" She turned and stormed out of the house.

"Er, hello? Giselle? Could you untie us please?" 


	12. The Cave Calliope

**Chapter 12: The Cave Calliope; A Dark and Evil Force; Burial Urn; A Dire Warning. **

Deep inside the caverns of the Isla de Muerta, the winds howled like a choir of oversexed alley cats. Up till today, the pirates thought there was only one entrance, but with their ears now filled with a cacophony of shrieks, wails, whistlings and yowls, it was clear the back side of the cavern consisted of a network of tunnels, cracks, fissures, tubes and crevasses, which let the wind come howling through. This was like taking shelter from a hurricane inside a calliope.

In the madly flickering torchlight, Tia Dalma emptied out the ashes from an Inca burial urn and then waded into the shallows of the underground inlet, picking up odd items to place into the urn: a pretty rock, a juvenile crab, a sand dollar, a bone splinter, a broken and badly rusted belt buckle.

"What are you doing, luv?"

"Shhhhhh!" The voodoo priestess kept searching.

Jack was squatting on the nearby rocky shore, his kohl-lined, sad eyes following her. "There's something I should tell you, I think. Yeah, I, no, never mind. I shouldn't bother you."

"Jack, you _are_ bothering me."

"It's just while we were sailing in front of that storm, I got the weirdest feeling that we were being driven, but not by just the storm. I couldn't shake the feeling that something dark and evil was herding us to this island."

"Ahhhhhh! You are right, Captain Jack Sparrow."

Jack yipped, "I am?"

"Oh yes."

"Then why are you smiling?"

"That dark and evil force you felt? She is me."

"You? You? Oh, well. That's a good thing then, yes?"

"If you think that darkness and evil are good, then your logic is infallible."

Jack's eye twitched. "What is it that you aren't telling me, luv?"

Her sneer showed blackened teeth, "Why, everything."

"Don't you think you should?"

"You mean, do I have time to chit-chat with you while a powerful and infuriated Amemoi is outside, raging, seething and battering this island as He tries to figure out how to murder us all?"

"Er, I wouldn't have put it exactly that way."

She glanced at him. "I would."

"Oh, then, I just sit here and be quiet, shall I?"

She ignored him and went on scavenging the sea bottom.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but one more question, luv, okay?"

Tia Dalma stopped her searching and glared at him.

"Why did, er, why did you give the jar of air to Anamaria instead of to me, after all we've been to each other?"

"And all we haven't been to each other?"

"Aye, that too."

Tia Dalma sighed. "Because her father is my father; because her mother is my mother; and because poor Anamaria is the runt of the litter. She practically has no powers at all: perhaps a little ability in fortune telling, some skill with the sea, and she's good using magical objects, but all in all, she is weak. It's up to me to provide my little sister with all the protection I can. Ah!" She fished a bent doubloon out of the inlet and added it to her collection of oddities.

"Your sister?"  
>"Aye, my sister."<p>

"Oh."

"Is that all you have to say?"

"I'm sorry I stole you sister's boat."

"Borrowed, Jack, without permission, but with every intention of returning."

"Aye, that's what I told her, luv. And then I got her another boat, a better boat, a bigger boat. -Where are you going?"

"Outside, Jack."

"Outside? Why?"

"Eurus is out there. He's in a bit of a homicidal mood right now, but as soon as I get him settled into this little urn, he'll calm right down." She placed a pocket flask of rum in the urn and picked up a pistol.

"He's a hurricane, hundreds of miles across by now. And you're going to cram him into that little jug?"

"Where else would you have me put him? His jar's broken. You made sure of that." Tia Dalma started to leave again, and then stopped. "Oh. One more thing, Captain Jack Sparrow."

"If the island starts to sink, get out of the cave fast."

"Sink? What on Earth would the island sink?"

"Eurus is a wind god. Gods don't take kindly to being bound. He might react somewhat violently."


	13. Tia Dalma vs Eurus

**Chapter 13: Tia Dalma vs. Eurus; The ****Isla de Muerta Goes Pair Shaped; Sisters' Secrets. **

Tia Dalma squirmed out of a hole between two rocks and up into the very teeth of the hurricane. She had been forced to abandon her skirt in one of the narrow crevices she'd squeezed through. Jack had seen the skirt fall and had followed her up.

It was almost impossible to stand in the face of the howling winds. Tia Dalma sheltered behind a swaying coconut tree, letting it absorb most of the blast.

"Nasty bugger, isn't He?" commented Jack as he crawled up behind her and squinted into the nearly horizontal rain. A frond came whipping in out of nowhere, bounced off the coconut tree and spun away up the mountainside. "Perhaps we should come back when He's in a better mood."

"Eurus!" Tia Dalma screamed up at the storm. Her words were pulled from her lips by the shrieking wind and hurled after the coconut frond. "You may have escaped, but You were never freed! You still belong to me!"

The wind raged around her.

She opened the urn, took out the flask, and began dousing the inside of the flask with the rum. "You are mine, Eurus! You are bound to me!"

A powerful gust ripped the metal flask from her hand, bounced it off a nearby boulder, and sent it bounding and ricocheting up the hill. Somewhere above, the hillside gave a mournful groan and shutter, and an avalanche of rocks and debris cascaded down, just missing them.

Tia Dalma sheltered the mouth of the urn with her body, held the hammer of the pistol over the opening, and pulled the trigger. When the gun discharged, some of the spark fell into the urn and ignited the rum. Black smoke billowed out. Tia Dalma jerked her head back, and she murmured loudly to the skies, "Eurus, Amemoi Lord, You remain my prisoner! Return to Your cell, by my command, by my word, by my will! You are now and shall evermore be my thrall! Obey, as You must!"

The heart of the hurricane spun down, revolving like a giant vortex. It stabbed into the urn. It spinning tail twisted down into it, spinning tighter and tighter. It was impossible for that much wind to squeeze into that small an urn, but it did. More and more of the hurricane's heart twisted down and slid into the open mouth of the urn.

When the last of it disappeared inside, Tia Dalma clamped the lid on and folded herself around the urn to keep it from battering itself to pieces on the nearby rocks.

Jack crept down and took one side of the urn. Tia Dalma took the other. Although the urn weighed next to nothing, it bucked and jolted like an infuriated stallion. Jack led the way backwards to the hole they had climbed out of, and carefully, he stepped down into it. The chimney-like tunnel twisted and jutted its way down into the earth. The urn fought them all the way down.

When they finally leaped the final few feet down to the cavern floor, Jack took the urn in both arms while Tia Dalma scrambled back into her skirt. Jack wrestled the urn over to the central pile of treasure.

"Sir, what do you have there?" asked Mr. Gibbs.

"A wind god, in a particularly bad mood if I do say so myself." Jack spotted a shallow hollow between some rocks and lowered the urn into it. "Quick! Get something to weigh in down!"

Mr. Gibbs, joined by Pintel and Cotton, hoisted one of the many jewel-filled chests on top of the hole.

"Splendid! Let's see Him get out of that!"

Seawater began cascading in through the openings in the back of the cave. Meanwhile, a large wave swept in through the main entrance and ran up to their ankles.

"Er, Captain? Why is water flooding into the cave from both directions at once?"

Anamaria gasped, "The island's sinking!"

"Don't be daft, girl," growled Mr. Gibbs. "Islands don't sink."

Tia Dalma shouted, "The island's sinking! To the longboat!"

"Aye!" shouted Jack. "To the longboat!"

They ran. A wave had swept the boat up and shoved it towards them. They caught it, shoveled in a few handfuls to treasure, then jumped in and pulled for their lives.

More and more waves were pounding in through the cave's main entrance as the island sunk lower and lower into the sea. The crew fought their way through them and out into the angry sea that was jumping, white capping, and dancing in the last winds of the dying hurricane.

"Pull!" shrieked Jack. "Pull for your lives!"

The island was rumbling, cracking and crumbling. Huge chunks of it soughed off and plummeted downwards.

Mr. Gibbs shook his head. "I ain't never seen nothing like this before!"

Pintel grumbled, "That is one angry god."

The _Black Pearl's_ anchor chain was taut as the crew rowed up to her. They scrambled aboard. Jack ran to the cable and began whacking furiously at it with his sword. Mr. Gibbs began ordering men to their stations. Anamaria and Tia Dalma seized boarding pikes and began stabbing the cable with them. Soon, the rope shredded and broke. The _Black Pearl_ righted herself, and a gust of wind blew her away from the sinking island.

"Our treasure!" wailed Pintel as the mouth of the cave disappeared under the waves.

Mr. Gibbs observed sagely, "Aye, but we came away with our lives. That's more important."

"Speak for yourself." Pintel wiped away a tear.

"Bloody wind god," sneered Jack.

Anamaria was at the great wheel, steering the battered ship further out to sea. The last of the crumbling island disappeared as her sister crossed the quarterdeck to where Anamaria was standing. "Poor Jack. He did so love that treasure."

"There'll be other treasures," said Tia Dalma.

"Is that why you did it?"

"Did what?"

"Why, sank the island of course."

Tia Dalma looked at her sister for a long time. "He asked me to save him from the assassins, and so I did. As long as he was a rich man, they would be hunting him. Besides, the land is no place for Captain Jack Sparrow. He'd never be happy sitting on a fat treasure. He needs to be out hunting more treasure. The treasure of The Isla de Muerta was killing him as surely as it was an anaconda around his throat. He's a man who needs freedom, not riches."

"Are you ever going to tell him that?"

"Don't be silly, girl. He's a man, and the only time men are truly happy is when they have no idea what's going on."

"Mr. Gibbs!" cried Jack's voice over the howl of the dying storm, "break out the rum. I have a hankering to get good and truly drunk!"

Anamaria, from her post at the great wheel, shouted, "What course do I set, Captain?"

"What course?" echoed Jack. "Why, to the horizon, lass. There's a world of adventure out there, and I am . . .," he stretched his hand to the sky, "Captain Jack Sparrow!"

**۞**

The End

**۞**

Author's Notes:

**۞**

Two lines from _Dead Man's Chest_ inspired this story. The first was Mr. Gibbs' comment about the Isla de Muerta going "pair shaped" and sinking beneath the sea. The second was when Jack discovered Norrington had been drummed out of the Navy and said, "You didn't actually try to sail though that hurricane, did you?" Upon those two statements, this story was built.

I liked Jack's jar of dirt, which he got from Tia Dalma in _Dead Man's Chest._ So I borrowed the concept here for Anamaria's jar of air. The idea of a wind god being "bound" inside the jar presages the revelation in _World's End_ that Tia Dalma is the goddess Calypso, bound into human form by the Brotherhood of Pirates.


End file.
